And could get K State in the 3rd round.shawnrbu said:Wichita got a brutal region. Michigan, Duke and Louisville.
yup and even if Kentucky loses, K State has the (slightly) closer commute, too.Plantiers Wart said:Toss in Kentucky in the second round, potentially. Group of death.
No way. No way should they be a 4.mabrowndog said:Oh, and halle-fucking-lujah for Louisville only being a #4 seed. Schedule strength rules, bitches. Kudos to the committee.
RedOctober3829 said:No way. No way should they be a 4.
Or maybe it's the luck of the draw. If Oregon, UConn, Texas or New Mexico slip to 8, they have a complaint that they should be above Kentucky. If Wisconsin or Kansas (likely with Embiid back for the regional) are the #2, instead of Michigan, is the complaint still valid? Michigan is a tougher opponent than Wisconsin? Wisconsin was ranked higher until their season-ending loss to Nebraska, and were in the top five for 5+ weeks. Michigan has never been in the top 5. Swap Michigan and Wisconsin (or Kansas), and then swap Louisville and Michigan State. Is Wichita State still screwed?BigSoxFan said:Wichita State really did get screwed by this seeding. . . and a potentially-dangerous 2nd round matchup with a raw Kentucky team that has like 4 or 5 future NBA players. Basically seems like the NCAA is sending a message that they didn't play anyone in the regular season so now prove it to us.
mabrowndog said:Oh, and halle-fucking-lujah for Louisville only being a #4 seed. Schedule strength rules, bitches. Kudos to the committee.
mabrowndog said:
Their non-conference schedule beyond UNC & Kentucky was a PILE OF CRAP. Hell, I'll even be generous and throw them a bone on Southern Miss. Here's the rest of their oh-so-challenging slate:
LA-Lafayette, Missouri St, Western Kentucky, Florida International, Hartford, Charleston, UMKC, Hofstra, Fairfield & Cornell.
What, did Pitino suddenly become coach at Tulane or something? Kansas manages to schedule Florida, Villanova, Duke, New Mexico, San Diego St, Georgetown & Colorado, and all Louisville can play outside the AAC is that agglomeration of dogshit?
They beat UConn three times. They beat Cincinnati once. They were swept by Memphis. That's a 4-3 record against the 2nd, 3rd & 4th place teams in their own conference. And there's really no need to go into how awful the bottom half of the AAC is.
Please. Show me what else they did to merit anything higher than the 4 line.
They got exactly what they deserved.
Louisville is the defending national champion, was ranked third in the preseason, was ranked fifth in the AP poll last week, won its conference championship in dominant fashion, and ranks between first and fourth nationally in each of the five computer systems. The team’s strength of schedule wasn’t great, but its five losses came against ranked opponents by single-digit margins. So how were the Cardinals a No. 4 seed?
The answer, almost certainly, is the selection committee’s attachment to Ratings Percentage Index (RPI), which somehow evaluates Louisville as only the 18th-best team in the country. RPI, as I’ve written previously, was “developed in 1981 in the era of the DOS prompt and the Commodore 64.”
There’s room to debate whether today’s computer systems give Louisville too much credit for blowout wins (such as its 61-point victory against Rutgers on Thursday). But it’s not as though the Cardinals are lacking in other credentials. The debate ought to have been about whether Louisville was a No. 1 seed or a No. 2.
That’s why they play the games, of course. But the problem with so badly mis-seeding a team is that it penalizes those that stand in its way. In this case, that means Wichita State, which will potentially face Louisville in the regional semifinals. Nor did the selection committee do the Shockers any favors: Kentucky is exceptionally talented for a No. 8 seed, as Duke is for a No. 3.
RPI is the Dick Morris of algorithms. Maybe I should challenge it to a bet.
Infield Infidel said:
The bookmakers’ first fix to this field would be making defending champion Louisville a No. 1 seed. [Wynn Sportsbook Director] Avello expected to find the Cardinals on the No. 2 line Sunday, but called even that placement “a really big stretch.”
He would currently favor Louisville in a game against any other team in the country, and said the Cardinals were assured to give points in every contest on their way to the Final Four. [LVH Sportsbook Director] Salmons indicated just two teams Louisville would post as an underdog against in the whole tournament — Florida, the overall No. 1 seed, and Michigan State, another No. 4 seed.
"We press like him, we trap like him, his offensive sets are just like ours," Pitino said of Masiello. "That's why I don't like the game. I don't think it's fair. I don't like it. I don't know why they would do it.
"I just don't like the game at all, for either one of us. We won the national championship and obviously we're more heralded, but this is anybody's game. This is not a 1-16."